The new production of The Fall at the Market Theatre takes place on a stage marked by a large red hashtag. All around it, scored in neat rows across the floor and the backdrop, are dozens of smaller hashtags. If you know anything about SA universities circa 2015-2016, you know what the icons signify: #RhodesMustFall and #FeesMustFall.

Ten years on, these social media throwbacks may seem rather quaint. At the time, however, they solicited powerful responses from students, university staff members, parents and members of the public — euphoria, dread, idealism, cynicism. The Fallist movement marked a new departure in post-apartheid SA: an overdue reckoning with the slow pace of institutional change, a damning indictment of state neglect, and an urgent call for socioeconomic redress...

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